[CHAPTER XXXI.]
BAD NEWS FOR HALLINGHAM.
"I say, Neal, what sort of a place is St. Paul's Churchyard?"
The questioner was Watton. She sat in the servants' room near the window, against which the rain was pattering, some household sewing in her hand. Neal, who had entered to get a glass he wanted was rather taken with surprise, but he was not one to show it in his manner.
"Did you never see it?" he asked.
"I saw it in a picture once. I couldn't see it elseways; I've never been to London?"
"It is a large space of land with houses round it and the cathedral in the middle," explained Neal, who seemed always ready to oblige his fellow-servants, especially Watton. "It's a thoroughfare, you know; the road from Ludgate Hill to Cheapside winds round on each side the cathedral, between it and the houses."
"Is it very noisy?"
"Pretty well for that. But the London people don't seem to care for noise. I expect they are so used to it that they don't hear it."
"The houses round St. Paul's are warehouses, aren't they?"